Mr V.N. Mathur, Managing Director, Bharuch Dahej Rail Company Ltd, has said the Railways had Rs 57,000 crore worth of projects on hand, of which Rs 8,000 crore was for new lines and Rs 6,500 crore for metro projects.

“There is still an infrastructure capacity problem, which can be tackled by the PPP mode only,” he said at a seminar on ‘Experience of PPP in Railways' here on Monday.

“The Indian Railways has 122 projects on the shelf, as well as 50 gauge conversion works. Many could be socially desirable projects that may not solve the capacity constraints — hence the only route left is private sector participation,” he said.

The year's Railway Budget had indicated that the Railways would be raising Rs 1,776 crore for 85 projects through the PPP route providing new opportunities for the private sector.

Prof. G. Raghuram of the Indian Institute of Management, Ahmedabad, said the Railways needed to sharpen focus on PPP projects, as the telecom sector had done.

Delivering the keynote address, he pointed out that rail-based transport has the least carbon footprint compared to land based transport modes. Hence, the Railways needs to have flexible approach, he felt.

Mr G. Ravi Kumar, Chief Operating Manager of South Central Railways, said the zone expected to handle over 100 million tonnes of freight this fiscal, with coal accounting for nearly 50 per cent of the throughput.

Hyd metro project

Ground work on the Hyderabad metro rail project is expected to get under way in the next two weeks, with pre-construction work on in full swing.

Nr N.V.S. Reddy, Managing Director of Hyderabad Metro Rail, expects the project to break even within five years of operation. “We expect non-fare revenue to be in the range of 40 per cent of the total turnover,” he told Business Line on the sidelines of a function here.

The project will involve some 18.5 million sft of space that can be put to commercial use through the lease route.

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